• Claudio Monteverdi Major Composition
• Madrigal Claudio Monteverdi

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• In music, the age began with the trail-blazing works of Claudio Monteverdi, continued with the phenomenally popular music of Antonio Vivaldi and the keyboard works of such composers as Fran&cced;ois Couperin and Domenico Scarlatti, and came to a close with the masterworks of two of the veritable giants of music history, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel.

Music History 102:

Antonio Vivaldi is known as the “Father of the Concerto”. Over his career he wrote over 450 concertos, both in solo and grosso form. With as many as he wrote, he solidified the structure of the form: three movements in a FAST-SLOW-FAST tempo organization. His most famous concertos are La Quattro Stagioni (The Four Seasons). A Vivaldi concerto usually has movements. A variable number of. Antonio Vivaldi. Pierluigi da Palestrina. Claudio Monteverdi. The is the person who beats time, indicates expression, cues in musicians, and controls the balance among instruments and voices.

The Baroque was a time of a great intensification of past forms in all the arts: painting saw the works of Vermeer, Rubens, Rembrandt, and El Greco — in literature it was the time of Molière, Cervantes, Milton, and Racine — modern science came into its own during this period with the work of Galileo and Newton. In music, the age began with the trail-blazing works of Claudio Monteverdi, continued with the phenomenally popular music of Antonio Vivaldi and the keyboard works of such composers as Fran&cced;ois Couperin and Domenico Scarlatti, and came to a close with the masterworks of two of the veritable giants of music history, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel.

The beginnings of Opera

In the last years of the sixteenth century, a group of musicians and literati in Florence, Italy experimented with a new method of composing dramatic vocal music, modeling their ideas after the precepts of ancient Greek theater. Their intent was that this new music should prove more direct and communicative to an audience, as the complex polyphony of the Renaissance could very often obscure the text being sung. They instead set a single melodic line against a basic chordal accompaniment, and with this notion of homophony, a new era of music began. The Florentine Camerata called this new form of musical-dramatic entertainment opera. The first operas were private affairs, composed for the Italian courts. But when in 1637 the first public opera house opened in Venice, Italy, opera became a commercial industry, and the genre in which many composers throughout history first tried out new ideas and new techniques of composition.

Claudio Monteverdi Major Composition

Claudio Monteverdi

Born: Cremona, (baptized May 15, 1567)
Died: Venice, November 29, 1643

The son of a doctor, Monteverdi studied music at the town cathedral in Cremona, and attained his first position as composer and instrumentalist at the court of the Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga of Mantua in 1591. In 1599 he married a singer at the court, Claudia de Cattaneis. The couple had three children before her untimely death in 1607. The composer remained a widower for the rest of his life. Although unhappy and grossly underpaid in Mantua, Monteverdi remained there until the death of Vincenzo in 1612, when he was relieved of his duties by the new duke. Soon after however, he was invited to serve as maestro di cappella at the Basilica of St. Mark in Venice, an extremely prestigious post. Monteverdi remained in Venice until his death in 1643.

Although required by his employers to compose much sacred music throughout his career, Monteverdi seemed most happy (and his art in greatest evidence) with secular music. Monteverdi composed and published dozens of madrigals throughout his life, and Zefiro torna is an excellent example of his art in that secular form. In this madrigal, Monteverdi uses the common technique of spinning out the melodic lines, one after the other, over a repeated bass figure. One of Monteverdi’s undoubted sacred masterpieces are the Vespers of the Blessed Virgin, composed in 1610. Monteverdi’s settings here vary between Renaissance polyphony and the newer homophonic sound of the Baroque. He was a master of both forms. The power and fervor of the writing can be heard in the “Lauda Jerusalem” from the Vespers of 1610, with the sound of instruments added to the choir.

Internationally famous through the publication of his madrigals, Monteverdi scaled new artistic heights with the composition of his operas. His first was L’Orfeo, called by the composer a “fable in music,” and was composed for the court of Duke Vincenzo in 1607. Many operas followed, but the music to them is unfortunately lost. Monteverdi’s final opera, written in 1642 when he was in his seventies, remains one of the landmarks of the new genre and his undisputed masterwork. Although the manuscripts that have survived consist only of the bass line and vocal parts, comprising mostly dramatic recitativo (melodic declamations over the bass, to which the instrumentalists fill in appropriate harmonies), the ensemble passages are of exceptional beauty. The frankly erotic moments between Nero (originally a part for a castrato) and Poppea (soprano) contain music that can still move and amaze modern audiences, as can be heard in the final duet, “Pur ti miro” from L’Incoronazione di Poppea. Opera remained popular throughout the Baroque age, culminating in the stage works of George Frideric Handel.

With his death in 1643, Monteverdi’s music fell into oblivion, as it was the nature of the times to perform only the very newest music. (Public concerts as we know them did not generally come about until the musical scholarship of the nineteenth century.) With the early music movements of the twentieth century and the rediscovery of his madrigals and sacred music, Claudio Monteverdi has at last been recognized as one of the true masters of Western music.

The Baroque Concerto

With the rise of purely instrumental music in the Baroque Age, there also arose a flowering of instrumental forms and virtuoso performers to play them. One of the earliest masters of the soon-to-be predominant form of the concerto was the Italian composer and violinist Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713). Corelli pioneered the form of the concerto grosso, in which the principle element of contrast between two independent groups of instruments is brought into play. The larger group is called the ripieno and usually consisted of a body of strings with harpsichord continuo, while a smaller group or concertino consisted of two to four solo instruments. The various sections of the concerto would alternate between fast and slow tempos, or movements. Later composers of the period such as Johann Sebastian Bach and Antonio Vivaldi transformed this genre into the solo concerto, in which the solo instrument is of equal importance as the string orchestra.

Antonio Vivaldi

Born: Venice, March 4, 1678
Died: Vienna, (buried July 28, 1741)

Another Italian composer and virtuoso violinist, Antonio Vivaldi is remembered today for the enormous number of concertos he composed throughout his lifetime. He most likely learned the violin from his father, himself a violinist at St. Mark’s in Venice. Antonio took holy orders to enter the Catholic Priesthood, and became known as “The Red Priest” due to the color of his hair. He became a teacher in Venice at the Ospedale della Pietà (a school for foundling girls) in 1703, and later became the director of concerts there. His music was extremely popular, and he traveled a great deal over Europe, spreading his fame as a violinist and composer. During the 1730s, however, his popularity began to abate and in 1738 he was dismissed from the Ospedale. Desperate, he eventually settled in Vienna in 1740, hoping to reclaim his fame. He didn’t, and he died there the next year, to be buried in a pauper’s grave.

Vivaldi’s most famous compositions are the concertos for one or more solo violins and string orchestra, although he composed a great deal of music in other genres, including cantatas, operas, trio sonatas and others. Indeed, Vivaldi’s instrumental works lay the foundation for the development of the concerto into the Classical Period. Among his published collections of string concertos are included La Stravanganza, Op. 4, La Cetra, Op. 9, and the ever-popular The Four Seasons, comprised of four concertos, each depicting aspects of the seasons of the year. For instance, the third movement of the Concerto in F “Autumn” imitates the sounds of a hunt. Vivaldi followed the usual pattern of the era in his concertos by framing a melodious or dramatic slow second movement with fast and lively first and third movements. Of his more than 500 concertos, some 290 are for violin solo and strings, or for string orchestra alone. However, Vivaldi also composed a great number of concertos for other instruments and various instrumental combinations. One such work is the sprightly Concerto in G major for two mandolins. The solo concerto reached its culmination during the later Classical Period in the concertos of Mozart and Beethoven.

Baroque music for the harpsichord

With a vast amount of choral and chamber music to his credit, François Couperin (1668-1733) was recognized in his day as the leading French composer. But it is for his harpsichord music that Couperin is best remembered today. He composed a great many suites (or ordres in French) consisting of dance movements and character pieces with such titles as “Butterflies,” “Darkness,” “Goat-footed Satyrs,” and “The mysterious barricades”. This is a charming and graceful music, beguilingly ornamented, and it opened a new direction for composers of keyboard music.

The later French composer Jean Philip Rameau (1683-1764) also composed some fine keyboard and chamber music in the new gallant style. At the age of fifty, Rameau successfully embarked on a new career composing the type of lavish operas and ballets so popular at the time in France. But Rameau is best known today as the music theoretician who first rationalized chords and chordal relationships into the harmonic system still studied by today’s music students.

Domenico Scarlatti

Born: Naples, October 26, 1685
Died: Madrid, July 23, 1757

Domenico Scarlatti was the son of Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725), himself a composer of a great many operas and cantatas. Domenico is known for being a harpsichord virtuoso and for the 555 or so sonatas he composed for that instrument. Having spent a great many years wandering about Europe evading the dominance and influence of his father, Scarlatti eventually settled in Lisbon, Portugal, where he found employment as teacher to the Infanta, Princess Maria Barbara. When the Infanta wedded the heir to the Spanish throne in 1729, Scarlatti was taken to Madrid where he spent the rest of his life. It was during this period that be began composing the little “exercises,” pieces for harpsichord that he called sonatas. Regarded as one of the founders of modern keyboard technique, Scarlatti’s sonatas employed such new devices as hand-crossing, quick arpeggios, and rapidly repeated notes. These sonatas are by turns capricious, charming, melodic, and witty, and such works as the Sonata in D major, K. 491 point the way to the keyboard figurations of the Classical Period.

Music History 102: a Guide to Western Composers and their music
Designed, compiled and created by
Robert Sherrane

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Early Music

Classical Editor: Rob Barnett Founder Len Mullenger

FROM MONTEVERDI TO VIVALDI CD 1 Claudio MONTEVERDI (1567-1643) ‘Venetian Vesper Music’ (Selva morale e spirituale) Dixit Dominus (II) a 8 [08:24] Confitebor tibi (II) a 3 [06:27] Beatus vir (I) a 6 [08:59] Laudate pueri (II) a 5 [06:52] Laudate Dominum (I) a 5 [04:48] Deus tuorum militum a 3 [02:43] Magnificat a 8 (completed by Andrew Parrott) [12:59] Jubilet tota civitas a voce sola in dialogo [04:42] Salve Regina a 3 [05:56] CD 2 ‘Venetian Church Music’ Giovanni GABRIELI (1553/56-1612) Intonatio del 9. tono (Intonationi d’organo, 1593) [0:44] In ecclesiis a 14 (Symphoniae sacrae, II, 1615) [8:12] Claudio MONTEVERDI Adoramus te, Christe a 6 (Motetti in lode d’iddio nostro Signore, 1623) [4:42] Alessandro GRANDI (1577-1630) O quam pulchra es (Ghirlanda sacra, 1625) [3:43] Dario CASTELLO (c1590-1644) Sonata seconda (Sonate concertate, libro secondo, 1629) [4:37] Claudio MONTEVERDI Exulta, filia Sion (Arie de diversi autori, 1624) [5:09] Giovanni LEGRENZI (1626-1690) Sonata da chiesa a 3, op. 8, 8 ‘La Bevilaqua’ (Sonate, libro III, op. 8, 1663) [5:16] Antonio LOTTI (c1667-1740) Crucifixus a 10 Antonio VIVALDI (1676-1741) Clarae stellae, scintillate (RV 625) [12:02] Antonio LOTTI Crucifixus a 6 Claudio MONTEVERDI Currite populi (Ghirlanda sacra, 1625) [4:09] Christe, adoramus te (Motetti in lode d’iddio nostro Signore, 1620) [3:00] Giovanni GABRIELI Canzon VIII a 8 (Canzoni e sonate, 1615) [5:09] Fuga del 9. tono Magnificat a 14 (Symphoniae sacae, II, 1615) [7:12] CD 3 Claudio MONTEVERDI ‘Madrigali guerrieri et amorosi’ (1638) Altri canti di Marte [7:36] Ninfa che scalza il piede [4:58] Chi vol haver felice [2:00] Hor ch’el ciel e la terra [7:18] Lamento della ninfa [5:44] Altri canti d’amor [8:45] Su, pastorelli vezzosi [3:58] Vago, augelletto [4:34] Volgendo il ciel (ballo) [11:41] CD 4 Antonio VIVALDI Instrumental music 4 Concerti for violin, strings and basso continuo, op. 8, 1-4 ‘Le Quattro Stagioni’: Concerto in E, op. 8,1 ‘La Primavera’ (RV 269) [10:04] Concerto in g, op. 8, 2 ‘L’estate’ (RV 315) [10:18] Concerto in F, op. 8, 3 ‘L’autunno’ (RV 293) [11:20] Concerto in f, op. 8, 4 ‘L’inverno’ (RV 297) [8:19] Concerto for 4 violins, viola and basso continuo in B flat (RV 553) [10:05] Sinfonia for strings and basso continuo in G (RV 146) [05:44] Concerto alla rustica for strings and basso continuo in G (RV 151) [03:50] CD 5 Antonio VIVALDI Religious music Gregorian chant Kyrie (Missa cum jubilis) [01:42] Antonio VIVALDI Gloria in D (RV 589) [29:09] Sinfonia ‘Al Santo Sepolcro’ in b minor (RV 169) [03:50] Laetatus sum (RV 607) [03:35] Gregorian chant Ave maris stella (hymn) [03:25] Antonio VIVALDI Magnificat in g minor (RV 610b) [13:24] Gregorian chant Salve regina (antiphon) [02:59] Antonio VIVALDI Laudate Dominum omnes gentes (RV 606) [01:51] Sonata ‘Al Santo Sepolcro’ in E flat (RV 130) [03:47] In exitu Israel (RV 604) [03:53] Emma Kirkby, Emily Van Evera, Nancy Argenta, soprano; Alison Place, mezzo-soprano; Margaret Cable, Catherine King, Randi Stene, contralto; Rogers Covey-Crump, Nigel Rogers, Jeffrey Thomas, tenor; David Thomas, bass; Chiara Banchini, Alison Bury, John Holloway, Elisabeth Wallfisch, violin; John Toll, organ Taverner Consort, Choir and Players/Andrew Parrott Recorded 1982-1992 VIRGIN CLASSICS5 62167 2 (62:57 + 72:45 + 57:28 + 59:44 + 67:45)

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This set of five CDs contains an overview of Venetian music from the late 16th to the early 18th century. Much changed during that time. Although Venice had long passed the zenith of its political power, from the 16th century onwards it became a cultural and musical centre, not only for Italy, but for Europe as a whole. The foundations were laid by Adrian Willaert, considered the father of the ‘Venetian school’, one of whose characteristics was the technique of ‘cori spezzati’. This practice of splitting up vocal and instrumental forces was encouraged by the unique architecture of Venice’s main cathedral, San Marco. Another feature of Venetian music was the high value the authorities placed on musical celebrations in praise of the political status of the city and its rulers, which resulted in the performance of ceremonial music with pomp and circumstance. The Venetian style was developed by uncle Andrea and nephew Giovanni Gabrieli. In the first half of the 17th century Claudio Monteverdi was the towering figure in Venetian music, which unfortunately put a highly skilled composer like Alessandro Grandi on the sidelines of musical history. In the first decades of the 18th century Antonio Vivaldi was the figurehead of Venetian music. At that time Venice had become what it is now: a tourist attraction. The recordings presented here were all made around 1990, with the exception of the first CD, recorded in 1982. They all date from the time the interpretation of Italian music was still firmly in the hands of Northern European musicians and ensembles, among which the British in many ways set the tone. Since then, a number of vocal and instrumental groups from Italy have started to take control of their own musical past. It has resulted in performances of Monteverdi, Vivaldi and others which are very different from most performances from north of the Alps. The question is: where does this leave these British recordings from the 1980s and early 1990s? Are they still worth having? I would say yes and no. If someone is interested in the history of the performance practice – as I am – this is a good opportunity to grab some remarkable examples of British interpretations of Italian music. If not, the quality of Andrew Parrott's ensembles is still such that there is much to enjoy, even when one prefers a more passionate and more idiomatic approach to this kind of music. But there are differences between these recordings: some have more chance of surviving the ‘Italian flood’ than others. So let me say something about the five CDs in detail. One of the strengths of Andrew Parrott’s ensembles is their inner coherency. Some of the soloists are regular members of the Taverner Consort, which is closely connected to the Taverner Choir. This makes them ideally suited for music where soli and tutti are closely interwoven. There is no place here for large solo voices. Monteverdi’s music needs first and foremost ensemble voices that blend well and have the same approach to the music. And since this selection from the ‘Selva morale e spirituale’ on the first CD is sung by some of the very best British singers of the early music scene, this is still a very enjoyable recording, even though the tempi are a little too slow and the whole is somewhat short on passion. The third CD, containing a selection from Monteverdi’s 8th madrigal book, entitled ‘Madrigali guerrieri et amorosi’, is different in this respect. Here, the shortcomings outweigh the merits. The pronunciation is not very idiomatic, the tempi almost always too slow and, most of all, the lack of passion seriously undermines the character of these works. The ‘stile concitato’, the ‘agitated style’ that Monteverdi employs here, is severely underplayed in this performance. The fourth CD consists of instrumental works by Vivaldi, most of them very well known, in particular the ‘Four Seasons’. This is the least convincing recording of the set. The playing is simply too stiff and colourless, the ornamentation not very imaginative, and the orchestral sound lacks depth and warmth. The solo violin is too prominent: in baroque concertos the solo instrument is a ‘primus inter pares’, which seems to have been overlooked here. And the tempi are on the slow side here as well – which is the common feature of all recordings in this set. The fifth CD is much better, and also very interesting as far as the interpretation is concerned. The problem with Vivaldi’s sacred music is that in the Ospedale, for which he wrote these works, only girls were singing, but the scores contain parts for tenor and bass. How were these parts sung? The Ospedale has been visited by many people from Italy and abroad, but nobody mentioned girls singing tenor and bass, which should have been a most remarkable phenomenon. But names of girls have been found with the addition ‘tenor’ or ‘bass’. So the theory – followed in this recording – is that these parts have been sung an octave above written pitch. This practice takes the tenor line regularly above the soprano line, altering the whole appearance of the music. At first hearing these works – of which the Gloria and the Magnificat are among the best-known vocal pieces by Vivaldi – seem totally new. Since the vocal lines are much closer together, the sound is denser than in a performance with men’s voices. An additional plus of this recording is the inclusion of some plainchant settings, which underlines the liturgical function of Vivaldi’s sacred works, and of some instrumental pieces intended for liturgical use, as the title ‘Al Santo Sepolcro’ suggests. The performance is very good and since others haven't followed this approach – as far as I know – this is certainly a recording to have. That leaves the second CD, which offers a picture of about 150 years of Venetian music. When it was first released, most pieces were little known and hardly ever recorded. That has changed: a composer like Dario Castello now regularly appears on concert programmes and Lotti and Grandi are not neglected anymore, even though there is still much to discover. That also applies to the music of Giovanni Gabrieli. The pieces recorded here belong to the better known, though. Most performances here are enjoyable, even if one would like to hear a more dramatic approach. But Randi Stene’s singing in Vivaldi’s solo motet is quite convincing, and Jeffrey Thomas does a good job in the solo pieces by Grandi and Monteverdi. Best of all are the works by Gabrieli. Here the qualities of the ensembles as mentioned above are evident and result in fine performances of this brilliant music. This set is a mixed bag. I would recommend CDs 1 and 5 without hesitation, and CD 2 with some reservations. CDs 3 and 4 are not up to today’s standards. As much as one can be thankful that recordings of this calibre are available again at a bargain price, Virgin Classics should do a better job in the technical field. It is a capital blunder that on the tray inlay (and on the back of the set) Monteverdi’s name is misspelled as ‘MonteRverdi’ (twice!). There are other printing errors as well, the name of Nigel Rogers (spelled as ‘Nigels’). The plainchant setting of the ‘Salve Regina’ on the fifth CD is listed as the last section of Vivaldi’s Magnificat. There are also omissions in the list of performers: no soloists are mentioned for Monteverdi’s ‘Jubilet tota civitas’ (one of them is Emma Kirkby), one of the bass viol players on CD 3 has been left out (Tina Chancey) and the members of the ensembles are not listed; only the names of the soloists are given. And it is a pity that the original programme notes have been dropped. There is a short essay about the history of Venetian music but no details about the compositions. And the buyer of this set really needs to be aware of the characteristics of Andrew Parrott’s interpretation of Vivaldi’s sacred music. Compilations like these should be taken just as seriously as new recordings. Johan van Veen

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Madrigal Claudio Monteverdi